GOP free-for-all for Coburn seat?

News that Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn will retire at the end of 2014, triggering a special election for his deep-red Senate seat in November, creates an unexpected opportunity for the deep bench of Oklahoma GOP pols to seek a higher office.

That means the Republican primary to replace Coburn could be a free-for-all.

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Three of Oklahoma’s five U.S. House members are seen as potential candidates: Reps. Tom Cole, James Lankford and Jim Bridenstine.

Insiders in the state expect Lankford to jump into the race; Cole, too, has long been seen as someone who could run for, and is interested in, seeking higher office.

Bridenstine, should he decide to run, would likely be the choice of outside conservative and tea party groups. The Senate Conservatives Fund hasn’t commented publicly on potential candidates to replace Coburn, but did endorse Bridenstine’s House reelection bid last spring.

Also on the shortlist are several state-level officials: Attorney General Scott Pruitt, Lt. Gov. Todd Lamb and Corporation Commissioner Patrice Douglas. And T.W. Shannon, the African-American speaker of the state House, will certainly be on Oklahoma insiders’ minds for the seat.

Gov. Mary Fallin announced Friday morning that the special election to fill Coburn’s seat will be held on Oklahoma’s regular election days this year: a primary on June 24, runoff election on Aug. 26 if necessary, and the general election on Nov. 4.

The filing deadline is April 11.

“There’s any number of people that are probably going to think about running for this,” said Dave Weston, chairman of the Oklahoma Republican Party. “It’ll be a highly competitive primary.”

Weston said dark horse candidates are also possible, noting that Coburn himself was the outsider in the 2004 primary.

Jim Inhofe, Oklahoma’s other senator, is also up for reelection this year, meaning the Coburn election will be held concurrently.

Kirk Humphreys, the former mayor of Oklahoma City who ran and lost against Coburn in the 2004 GOP primary, said the race to fill Coburn’s seat could be “like a cattle call.”

At the same time, he said, one factor could keep the field smaller: because the special election will be held at the same time as the state’s regularly scheduled elections, anyone whose current position is up for reelection this year will have to consider whether to give up his or her seat in order to run for Senate.

“It’s not a free shot [for the nomination] … these are pretty smart people, they’ve got something to lose and I suspect they’ll sort that out beforehand,” he said.

That applies to almost all of the potential candidates being mentioned: Cole, Lankford and Bridenstine all have House elections in November, and Pruitt, Lamb and Douglas all are up for reelection statewide this fall as well.

“That may narrow the field a little bit,” Weston said. “Had [the election] been in 2015, that probably would have opened the door for a more contested primary.”

Correction: A previous version of this article misstated when Coburn first ran for federal office. He ran for and won a U.S. House seat in 1994.

CORRECTION: Corrected by: Trevor Eischen @ 01/17/2014 05:11 PM
Correction: A previous version of this article misstated when Coburn first ran for federal office. He ran for and won a U.S. House seat in 1994.